What are the implications regarding the lack of SAML 2.0 support in SharePoint 2013?

Question

I have repeatedly seen that SharePoint doesn't support SAML 2.0. What does that really mean and how might SharePoint admins and developers be impacted?

My specific scenario is that I want to connect to an external app via a custom SharePoint solution. I can authenticate to that app via SAML 2.0 through ADFS. That app only supports SAML 2.0, not SAML 1.1. If a user is already authenticated through ADFS via SharePoint (Service Provider Initiated Login) can I then use those credentials to connect to a 3rd party app utilizing those credentials (Identity Provider Initiated Login)?

Answer 1

Which ADFS is being used? If I remember right, ADFS 2.1 and on support mixed mode (SAML 2.0 and SAML 1.1 at the same time). This means you can have one Relying Party that is 2.0 (3rd party app) and one that is 1.1 (SharePoint). If this is the case, I don't foresee any issues. However, you might have to transform the SAML 1.1 message to SAML 2.0 so that the right FedAuth cookies are present.

On a related note, SharePoint 2016 still only supports SAML 1.1.